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February 28, 2003

It's Getting Ugly

As good a general indicator of our economic hosedness as any (besides, I guess, being a running joke on Doonesbury) is the fact that a bailout of Portland public schools is about to lend the stink of desperation to the usual city/country conflict as rural representatives come for our tax revenues.

It's really special: Portlanders bite the bullet and vote for measure 28, the rest of the state slaps it down, so when Portland bites another bullet and levies a tax on its businesses to scrape up the $15 million it needs to keep the schools from chopping three weeks off the year, the rest of the state is standing there with its hand out because suddenly the rural Republicans are all about equitable distribution of wealth.

I get the feeling our Republican Maoists aren't going to be encouraging their municipalities to raise their own taxes.

Anyhow... Portland Communique has more, as does The Oregon Blog. A look around Portland Communique's recent entries will net a more lucid rundown than I can provide.